1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a scanned image management device in which the ease of retrieval and the reusability of scanned and registered images are increased.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, although the electronization of documents in offices is progressing considerably, a considerable number of paper documents received from the outside and a considerable number of handwritten paper documents also exist.
In order to unify such a large number of paper documents electronically and to manage them efficiently, it is proposed that paper documents are scanned by a scanner function, such as in an MFP (multi-function peripheral), and the scanned images are stored as image files so that management of the image files is performed.
Conventionally, the scanned images are merely entered into folders of a directory type storage system, which folders are classified, for example, on a date-stamp basis, on an operator basis, or on an organization basis.
On the other hand, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 2003-345920 discloses a document management method which is adapted to provide a document management service to a remote user via a network with good flexibility in an efficient manner.
Since the scanned images conventionally are entered into the folders of the directory type storage system as mentioned above, there has been a problem that, even if the user wishes to acquire a certain scanned image subsequently, the user has only a few search keys suitable to acquire it, and the ease of retrieval and the reusability of the scanned images are low.